gross out

“The Substance,” her Cannes-winning gross-out joke about an aging Hollywood actress with a high threshold for self-inflicted pain, boasts more butts per minute than a chainsmoker’s ashtray, a feat all the more monumental for the film’s nearly 2½-hour running time.

To capture that excitement, we asked Times staffers to look into their crystal balls and preview the culture likely to dominate the water-cooler conversation this season, from “The Substance,” a gross-out parable of Hollywood glamour, to “Interior Chinatown,” a clever send-up of the industry’s history of Asian stereotypes, to Shaboozey, the genre-defying artist poised to take the Fonda by storm next month.

It slicks its politics in comically outsized gross-out violence.

“The Substance,” directed by Coralie Fargeat, offers plenty to talk about, from Moore’s go-for-broke, bare-it-all performance to an outrageous finale that consistently pushes the line on gross-out gore.

Katie Duffy, vice president and general manager of seasonal at Ferrara Candy Co., which owns Brach’s, acknowledged there was a “gross-out” factor.